Tag Archives: PrEP

On Wednesday, April 26th, we launched our new zine Come Out Fighting at Pantibar in Dublin. The zine was created by Butcher Queers and Masc. for ACT UP Dublin and features work from writers, activists, photographers and artists.

It was a fun evening, fantastic for everyone involved in creating the zine to get a chance to meet each other in person. We gave away dozens of copies and had a lot of lively conversations about the zine and what ACT UP is doing.

We think there’s something special about holding an actual paper copy of a zine in your hands, but we also want to make sure people who weren’t able to get a copy have a chance to read the zine. So we’ve put the whole thing online. Click here to view or download a copy.

If you’d like to contribute to our next issue, please get in touch! You can reach us through our Facebook page, or directly by email at act.up.dublin@gmail.com.

This morning members of ACT UP Dublin gathered at the offices of the Department of Health in Hawkins House with a giant alarm clock to wake the public to Ireland’s HIV crisis. We want to rouse government, community stakeholders, and the public at large into action to address the ongoing epidemic.

This World AIDS Day we are changing the conversation, and drawing attention to the political dimensions of the epidemic. New HIV diagnoses are at an all-time high in Ireland and the government response is falling short.

We in the community are ready for new prevention options like PrEP. Further delay on PrEP will result in avoidable new transmissions. It’s time for all of us to break the silence and demand an effective response.

Our press release can be downloaded as a pdf here. The full text follows a few pics we took…

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: act.up.dublin@gmail.com
www.actupdublin.com

WORLD AIDS DAY 2016: IRISH GOVERNMENT MUST DO MORE TO COMBAT THE EPIDEMIC

NOVEMBER 30, 10:00am , Hawkins House

On the eve of World AIDS Day, ACT UP Dublin is sounding an alarm to government, community stakeholders, and the public: Ireland is in the midst of an HIV crisis.

This morning in front of the Department of Health Offices at Hawkins House, ACT UP is installing an alarm clock to wake Ireland’s dormant institutions to the need for a renewed effort to address the expanding epidemic.

Thanks to advances in treatment and prevention, government has powerful new ways to reduce new HIV transmissions. ACT UP calls on authorities to do more than offer words. Government should devote greater resources, and take effective actions, to address the epidemic.

FACTS:

– In 2015, Ireland recorded the highest number of new HIV diagnoses ever in the history of the epidemic. Gay and bisexual men are particularly affected, now constituting over half of new diagnoses. Even accounting for those previously diagnosed elsewhere, new diagnoses in the LGBT community have been increasing for over a decade.

– More people in Ireland are living with HIV than ever before. Yet government and community organisations are not doing enough to meet our ongoing needs.

– Government should bring health surveillance efforts up to par with peer countries.

What is ACT UP?

ACT UP Dublin is a local chapter of ACT UP, The AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, an international HIV activist organisation. ACT UP Dublin was founded in July 2016 to take action on Ireland’s HIV crisis. We seek a more urgent and effective response to HIV from government authorities, community organisations, and the public at large.

ACT UP Dublin will present a community forum about pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV—more commonly known as PrEP—this Thursday, November 10 at 7PM. The forum is intended to spark community discussion about HIV prevention and to encourage community involvement in Ireland’s HIV crisis. More people were diagnosed with HIV in Ireland in 2015 than ever before.

The event will feature short informational talks about PrEP, followed by a substantial period of questions and commentary from members of affected communities. Dr. Paddy Mallon, from the HIV Molecular Research Group (UCD), will speak on medical and scientific aspects of PrEP, including future research that will be conducted in Ireland.

The discussion will be moderated by Dónal Mullligan, lecturer in the School of Communications at DCU.

What is PrEP?PrEP is a safe and highly effective way for people who are HIV-negative to prevent HIV by taking a single daily pill. The pill, with the brand name Truvada, has been approved for use in HIV prevention in eight countries around the world. It received marketing authorisation from the European Medicines Agency in August.

When used as directed, PrEP provides nearly complete protection from HIV. The World Health Organization, the US Centers for Disease Control, and UNAIDS all recommend that PrEP should be available to people at substantial risk for HIV.

Irish authorities, under the aegis of the National Sexual Health Strategy (2015), are currently assessing whether, when, and how to make PrEP accessible in Ireland.

What is ACT UP?ACT UP Dublin is a local chapter of ACT UP, The AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, an international HIV activist organisation. ACT UP Dublin was founded in July 2016 to take action on Ireland’s HIV crisis. We seek a more urgent and effective response to HIV from government authorities and community organisations.

PrEP is only approved and widely available in a few countries around the world, but people are finding ways to access it on their own. The “PrEP in the Wild” survey is trying to learn more about people’s experiences around the world. The survey is still open, but some preliminary results were presented at the HIV Research for Prevention conference in Chicago earlier this week. Aidsmap has a report:

An increasing number of gay men and others at risk of HIV are seeking to protect their health with PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis), but the lack of PrEP provision and lack of regulatory approval in many countries is leading people to take PrEP without medical supervision and on an ad-hoc basis. This will undermine the safety and effectiveness of PrEP, Jerome Galea said as he presented results of the PrEP in the Wild survey to the HIV Research for Prevention (HIVR4P 2016) conference in Chicago yesterday.

“The official authorities are playing catch up and failing in their duty to protect public health,” commented the authors of a separate report on PrEP Access in Europe.

Have you used PrEP ‘in the wild’? We’d love to hear from you! If you’d be willing to share your story please get in touch with us.

You can reach us with a message to our Facebook page, or by email at act.up.dublin@gmail.com. We’ll keep your details private and will not make any identifying information public.

We’re excited to be hosting “PrEP: the pill that can prevent HIV”, a community forum about pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV (PrEP) on Thursday, November 10th, at the Cobblestone in Smithfield. The event will run from 7 to 9pm, with doors opening at 6:30. The event is free and open to anyone who is interested in learning more about PrEP.

The evening will begin with brief presentations on PrEP, followed by an open discussion. Attendees can ask questions and learn more about how PrEP works, what the obstacles to getting access here are, and how they can get involved in making it available in Ireland.

We’re very fortunate to have Dr. Paddy Mallon to present on the science behind PrEP and to talk about the medical aspects of this new HIV prevention method. As well as being a consultant working in HIV care, Dr. Mallon is head of the internationally-recognised HIV Molecular Research Group at UCD. His research has covered a range of HIV-related areas including long-term effects of antiretroviral treatment and expanding access to HIV testing.

We’ll be posting additional information over the next few weeks here and on the Facebook event page. We encourage people to submit questions or let us know about specific issues that they’d like to know more about either through our Facebook page or by email at act.up.dublin@gmail.com.